Embodiments of the inventive concept relate to methods of operating a data storage device, and more particularly, to methods of initializing mapping information between addresses associated with logical and physical addresses in response to a single initialization command provided by a host.
Various flash-based storage devices are widely used in universal serial bus (USB) flash drives, digital cameras, cellular phones, smartphones, tablet personal computers (PCs), memory cards, solid state drives (SSDs), etc. For ease of operation, the data storage space provided by a flash-based storage device is usually divided according to a number of logical partitions. Erase operations may be performed in units defined by these logical partitions in response to erase command(s) received from a host. Assuming there are ‘N’ logical partitions corresponding to ‘N’ physical regions of a flash-based storage device, a host will output an erase command ‘N’ times to the flash-based storage device in order to erase the entirety of the memory space provided by the flash-based storage device. Thus, where the memory space provided by a flash-based storage device is organized according to several hundred logical partitions, a controlling host will be required to output several hundred erase commands to the flash-based storage device in order to erase all of the memory space.
The so-called embedded multimedia card or eMMC is one type of flash-based storage device that logically divides its memory space according to a number of “logical partitions”. Hence, in order to erase the entire flash memory area of an eMMC, multiple erase commands equal to the number of logical partitions must be issued from the host.
The so-called universal flash storage (UFS), another type of flash-based storage device divides its flash memory area according to a number of logical partitions commonly called “logical units”. Hence, similar to the eMMC, in order to erase the entire flash memory area of a UFS, multiple commands equal to the number of logical units must be issued by the host.
From the foregoing examples of a broad class of flash-based storage devices, it may be understood that as the size of flash memory areas increases, and as the number of logical partitions or logical units increase accordingly, the time required to perform a “full erase” (i.e., the erasure of the entire memory space provide by the flash memory area) will also increase. Unfortunately, extended full erase times impair the overall operating capabilities of the constituent flash-based storage devices.